United States - Foreign policy

Overall, Bush tended to be Clinton's antithesis. Early in his
presidency, he worked to involve other nations minimally, in sharp
contrast to the Clinton administration's multilateralism. In this
and other policies, the Bush administration opted to abandon the Kyoto
Protocol, a legal agreement proposed by European nations to cut down the
pollution blamed for global warming. Bush also worked to dissolve the
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM) with Russia. Displeased by these
maneuvers, some European and Asian allies called Bush's foreign
policies "cowboy diplomacy." Concerns lingered over trade
issues, North and South Korea, and what some considered Bush's
refusal to engage in the Middle East. By mid-2002, as suicide bombings
increased and tensions escalated as a result, Bush was forced to take a
stand; he called for the creation of a provisional Palestinian state,
predicated on the installation of a new leader to replace Yasser Arafat.

When a U.S. spy plane doing routine surveillance near China's
southern coast was hit by a Chinese fighter aircraft, the Bush
administration was able to resolve the issue with the Chinese government
through a careful apology, short of a humiliating surrender. Bush also
made a quick friend of Mexican president Vicente Fox, and he forged warm
relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Despite their inability
to agree about the ABM treaty, Bush and Putin signed a new treaty
reducing nuclear missiles.

The defining moment of Bush's presidency and one that profoundly
redefined his approach to foreign affairs, occurred on 11 September
2001, when suicide bombers sent two commercial airplanes into New York
City's World Trade Center Towers, one airplane into the Pentagon
in Washington D.C., and one into a field near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
These events killed thousands in a single day and brought a death toll
on American soil unheard of since the Civil War.

In a speech to Congress nine days later Bush said: "Every nation
in every region now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or
you are with the terrorists." This approach became known as the
Bush Doctrine on anti-terrorism.

As Bush set forth to punish the perpetrators, he became immensely
popular among Americans. His administration built a coalition of 120
countries to capture those suspected of directing the attacks: Osama bin
Laden, the al-Qaeda network, and Bin Laden's Taliban protectors
in Afghanistan. By December 2001, following a U.S.-led military
campaign, the Taliban had collapsed and an interim government was
installed in Afghanistan.

On a grand scale, countries worked to stop the movement of terrorists.
The United Nations Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1373,
which called on all member states to join the struggle against
international terrorism and allowed for the coalition's military
intervention in Afghanistan. Some member nations detained suspects,
while others offered the U.S. military assistance and overflight rights.
For the first time, NATO invoked Article 5, which declares an attack on
one member as an attack on all. NATO surveillance aircraft were deployed
to patrol American skies, Japan sent a warship to the Arabian Sea and
Germany sent ground troops outside Europe, which had not been done since
World War II.

The Bush doctrine came under severe strain in 2002 as tensions in the
Middle East escalated to the brink of war. A series of deadly
Palestinian suicide bombings targeted against the Israeli civilian
population prompted a brutal and sustained military response by the
Israeli Defense Force. Thousands of suspected terrorists were arrested
and the infrastructure of the West Bank was reduced to rubble. The
violence is considered by many to be a root cause of much anti-American
sentiment in the Arab world and Europe. In 2003, President Bush stood
firmly behind the so-called "road map," a plan for peace
in Israel and the occupied territories drafted by the United States,
European Union (EU), Russia, and the UN (the "quartet").
The Palestinian Authority named Mahmoud Abbas prime minister, a man with
whom Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon stated he would negotiate.

President Bush led the United States to war with Iraq on 19 March 2003.
In the prelude to the outbreak of hostilities, Bush and British prime
minister Tony Blair were faced with opposition within the UN Security
Council—primarily led by France, Germany, and Russia—to
the passage of a resolution authorizing the use of force against the
Saddam Hussein regime if it did not disarm itself immediately of weapons
of mass destruction. The UN Security Council had passed Resolution 1441
in November 2002, allowing for the reintroduction of weapons inspectors;
however, the Bush administration doubted their effectiveness and thus
called for more severe measures to be taken. Baghdad fell to U.S. forces
on 9 April (southern Iraq had been secured by British troops), and on 1
May, Bush declared major combat operations had ceased and that the
United States and its allies had prevailed. Coalition forces were then
occupied with the task of restoring order and basic services such as
electricity and running water to the country. As of mid-2003, the United
States had appointed a civilian administrator for Iraq, and plans for
the creation of an interim government were being made. In addition to
guiding the transition to a legitimate government and stable society in
Iraq, Bush is also faced with repairing the damage done to diplomatic
relations within the trans-Atlantic Western alliance.

As suicide bombings against Western targets continued around the globe
in 2002–03, Bush asserted stepped-up measures needed to be taken
against international terrorism.

In his 2003 State of the Union Address, President Bush pledged $15
billion to fight HIV/AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean. Such outreach to
regions of the world which normally do not enjoy the same level of
attention with regard to U.S. foreign policy as other, more high-profile
crises, was seen as both surprising and generous on the part of Bush.

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